For me I really want to move over to a Linux phone in the next few years. My current phone doesn't support any custom ROMs and I'm not willing to risk a gsi build or similar to get lineage working. I think my current Motorola edge 40 neo will last me another 2 years maybe, but once it starts showing signs of death, I will be buying something either pre-installed with Linux or offers a straight forward enough path to flash Linux of some sort. I am happy with a clean experience with a solid web browser and no other apps. As another option, being able to install android apps would be good, but I don't want that if it compromises the os.
Firstly you most likely just cannot. Device support is very narrow.
But I have a phone I got secondhand just to play with it. I want to love it, but it feels dated. The gestures make using a lot of stuff hard. But the biggest thing is that in my country I can't even make calls due to no VoLTE support. Kinda kills even using it daily even as an experiment.
I did submit a pull request to add Colemak keyboard layout support to the keyboard though, which was accepted. So technically I'm a contributor :)
Ubuntu Touch is still in the stages of “Wouldn’t this be nice?” Nevertheless, it would be nice to see it get some dedicated work.
yea. "can you?" is a more apt question for this headline
It doesn’t have 2 of the biggest corporations in the world funding it. Maybe something can be done at policy level to get it up to speed. With Linux at foundation we already have like 70%.
plus their iron grip control on how devices are locked down to prevent just this type of competition.
There are a few competitive devices that even come with Ubuntu Touch preinstalled.
nowhere to be found in my country though
Just ordered a cheap Nord N100 should arrive soon, just for purpose of testing/running UT. Tried UT little over a year ago, as someone else mentioned the VoLTE is/was a full stopper in USA, which sounds like progress made(?) based on user comments
I'll work around loss of apps, for example banking app if I have a good browser. Sure, more painful but I only need that in a pinch. Same for many other missing apps
Build around a solid browser experience I think would ease the transition, for people like myself who are slowly heading toward a more "dumb phone" experience and back to PC/laptop for most needs. I am likely a minority there though
Looks like uWolf browser and a new one (to me) called Merezhyvo Browser are having good success
In any case, look forward to seeing how it goes this time around :)
I'd gladly replace Android with any flavor of Linux whenever possible. But the phone and TV set top industries make it difficult/impossible. And the next barrier is whether my family could operate these without patience for bugs and missing features.
I love the bleeding edge and all that comes with it, but I'm not willing to give up on a lot of the apps I use and to be honest, I don't wanna give up on Material 3 Expressive either.
I don't see why you'd need to run pure Linux over Android. Android phones at their core are a Java app running under Linux. There were even lawsuits because Android was originally a Java app.
Working on the open Android projects seems more productive.
Android is a Google project, you'll always keep fighting your upstream.
It would be a hard fork which Google is forcing anyway. That's the path Graphene is taking.
It's start with a basic working phone gui and apps and improve it (Graphene's path) or start with absolutely nothing and build everything again (Pine OS etc's path).
I prefer just reusing the same software I use on my desktop, which is what I'm doing on my phone. I've ported Mobian to the Pixel 3a for precisely that reason.
I want the same software on the go.
Only available for phones you've never heard of or phones no one bought. Like Volla or Pine or Fair, and very specific versions.
Fair is good
OnePlus 6T runs great
I was so stoked to try it in 2013(?) when it released, but lack of apps or supports just makes it hard to switch from android. Shame it hasn't made much headway now
I installed in on my pixel 3a. It was neat when I tried Ubuntu touch in 2012 and it felt like a throwback to back then when I first booted it recently.
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